This gripping history of a little-known and desperate attempt to save Hungary's Jewish population in World War II tells how Joel Brand and the Jewish rescue committee in Budapest bargained with Adolf Eichmann and Heinrich Himmler to save the Jews there, held hostage as a bargaining chip to extract funds and materiel from the Allies.

"Joel Brand was a former communist, a committed Zionist, and physically unimpressive. Yet he brought great energy to efforts to bargain with Hungarian and German officials to 'ransom' Jews, exchanging their lives for material aid for the Axis cause. He did so despite the opposition of the British and American governments, leaving a legacy of bitterness that still persists. This is a fine examination of one of the saddest episodes of the Holocaust."—Booklist